Radio receivers for paging that include a message display panel conventionally scroll the message contents in a limited display area or display window to report the message to the person who has the receiver. That is, when the user presses a switch, all or a portion of the message information is shown to him in the limited message display area, character by character, and in an order beginning with the first character.
However, someone using a paging receiver with such a scrolling display will soon discover that it takes a considerable amount of scrolling to read a received message. For example, if the message display area can only show 16 characters at a time and if the received message is 350 characters long, the scrolling area will have to be used at least 2 times to deliver the full message. Obviously, such scrolling is even more inconvenient when the user wishes to read several individual messages received and stored by the paging receiver over a period of time.
For quickly scanning through multiple messages, some paging receivers have a "truncated display" function that permits just the first few characters of each message to be scrolled, rather than all of the characters of each message. Unfortunately, scanning through only such initial portions of the messages is often ineffective in helping the reader grasp their contents and importance.